Gladiolas

I'm back from Easter holidays & a bit exhausted. I'll be entering my last trimester in a few days from now. Not feeling the change yet. It was a long break we got together; 5 days in a stretch.

During the last few weeks of winter, the summer corms are sold usually in super markets & garden shops here. We'd bought a large bag of Gladiola corms, about a 50 of them. Guess they were of different colors. During the first few weeks of spring or after the last frost has disappeared, these bulbs can be planted.

So we prepared two patches to bury them. Two things to make sure before burying them; one is that patch should be receiving about 8-10 hours of sunlight daily & the other the soil should be loose & moist. We buried them at a height of approximately 8 cm from the ground level with a distance of 5" from each other. If you want to have a continuous bloom season, then don't plant all the corms together. Plant them with a gap of 2 weeks of so to have blooms till the hard frost sets in. Watering is essential. The soil should never dry out. Rain seldom supplies enough moisture, but start watering when there are five leaves on the plants.

Cutting the blooms: -

An impressive suggestion given by of the Brenda Hyde is quoted below. I would be following the same.

"Cutting your gladiolas is a little different than most flowers. You want to cut when at least 3 of the "florets" on the stem have opened. They will continue to open in the vase. Cut when it's cool, in the morning or evening. When cutting you want to leave as much foliage as you can on the plant. Like other corms and bulbs they receive nutrients through the foliage. If you have the room it's really nice to have a cutting garden where you can grow rows of glads that have been staggered in their planting as I mentioned, to cut and bring in the house throughout the summer season. They are an elegant and beautiful flower worth growing for border color and cutting. "

Care & storage of the Corms:-

Individual flowers can be cut off as they fade. Cut back flower stalks once all flowers have gone. I would prefer to leave the foliage intact, so that the corm for the next year is good enough. Care should be taken to remove the weeds. The new corm & the new roots are formed on top of the old one during the growing season.

To store the corms / bulbs for the next season: -
Leave about an inch of the stem & then cut. Dry the corms & store at about 20 Deg C for a month. Divide the bulbs carefully & clean the debris. Do not wash the bulbs with water at any time. This might decay the lot. Let them be at 20 Deg C for a week. Then they can be stored at 10 Deg C in a box with paper or hay.

As & when we've the blooms I shall post the photos.

Tulipa

Tulipa is commonly known as Tulips. I got to know this of course from Wikipedia. I knew Netherlands was famous for Tulips. But, never thought Tulips were not native to Netherlands. Forget Netherlands, Tulips are not native to Europe itself. Most of the European countries who formed their colonies throughout the World brought the tulip bulbs back to their home countries as a souvenir. The flowers usually have 5 petals. But now there are so many hybrids & more & more research yields a new lot every year.

A tulip or a daffodil bulb is an embryo or the food storage of the plant. One of the website called these beauties "the jewels of Spring". It's so pleasing to see the colorful buds that make their way out in early spring. "New Life" as it's rightly said marks the arrival of Spring.

The way I'm planting the bulbs in our garden since the last 3 years is quite simple. I don't use lot of compost or fertilizer to provide nutrition to the bulbs. I plant the bulbs in late fall sometime in the last week of October just before we change to winter time. The bulbs are placed with the pointing edge facing the sky. A good 8-10" hole is dug in the soil & onions are placed at a distance of around 5-10 centimeters from each other. I chose a fairly sunny spot for it. The foliage start showing as early as February when the soil temperature slightly increases. I've observed this for the last two years. If you want to force them bloom, then the bulbs can be planted in a pot; kept outside till you see the foliage & then bring them inside. But I wouldn't recommend this. If the fall season is very dry, then the bulbs need water. So I think I'd watered them like once in two days.

Care for the Tulip bulbs after they bloom: - After the flowering in spring has gone by, cut the flowers stalks till completely. I usually leave the foliage to turn yellow naturally. These bulbs are also similar to the Daffodil bulbs. If the foliage is chopped of early, there is no food stored in the bulbs & they might not bloom during their next season. Once they dry, cut them. The onions are removed from the soil, cleaned & then stored in boxes with dry grass / hay or paper.

There are many websites guiding the plantation & storing of these bulbs. Most of them suggest the same procedure. I avoid the usage of fertilizer.

The snaps above are of the blooms from our Garden. Some of the beautiful memories captured over the years from our frequent trips to Lisse, Netherlands.